Beginning in the 1950s, Albert Ellis laid the foundations for a major portion of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) with his colorful descriptions of negative thought patterns, descriptions that remain useful to the present day. Yet these venerable tools also have their limitations and misuses.

Early in the new year many people resist making New Year’s resolutions because of past disappointments or lack of confidence in their own abilities. If we could understand ‘resolutions’ in their larger context, we could use them for their proper purpose as tools to achieve what we most desire.

“What do you want to be when you grow up?” This innocent question is maddeningly hard to answer for many young people. Part of the difficulty is born of the surreal environment we build for our children and the distance we put between them and the adult world.

Your first sessions in therapy are likely to revolve around collecting details of your life. What your family tree, your childhood friends, or a major illness may have to do with your current situation may not be apparent at first, but there’s more to know about taking a client history.

Our modern culture’s attachment to excess is easy to see in the material realm: bigger homes, bigger cars, and bigger paychecks. The simplicity movement has done well pointing out the downsides of the “bigger is better” aesthetic. However, a predisposition to excess can also infest our minds. Sometimes the smartest thing to do is to think less.

All of us on the team would like to offer a big thanks and welcome to Dr Sarah Walker, who joins us for the Ask the Psychologist column.

For all the value that psychology contributes, the field doesn’t get the respect it deserves. Psychology is a science — a behavioral science — and deserves to be acknowledged as such.